Your UK police pension if you move to Australia
deferred benefits, transfers, tax and the State Pension

When you resign from a UK force to join an Australian one, your UK police pension doesn't disappear and it doesn't follow you. For almost everyone it becomes a deferred pension: the benefits you've built stay in the UK scheme and are paid later, at an age set by the scheme your service is in. You stop paying contributions and stop building new UK benefits.

In Australia you'll build superannuation on top: at least 12% employer super in WA and SA and 18% in Queensland. So in retirement you'd usually draw two pensions from two countries, taxed in one of them. This page explains each piece, in the order you'll meet them.

Officers in England and Wales have been in up to three schemes. Everyone still serving moved into the 2015 scheme by 1 April 2022, but service before that may still sit in the 1987 or 2006 scheme as "legacy" benefits. Each part follows its own scheme's rules when you leave, so one officer can have a deferred pension at 60 and another at State Pension age.

Your annual benefit statement shows which schemes you're in. If you're not sure, Police Pay UK's guide to the police pension schemes explains each one and who ended up where, and its pension calculator projects your benefits.

Each slice of your service follows its own scheme's rules when you leave.

Under the 2015 scheme, the Home Office says you become a deferred member if you leave with at least two years' qualifying service. Your pension account is then fixed, apart from revaluation. Leave before age 55 and the deferred pension is payable from your State Pension age, not the scheme's normal pension age of 60, because that age applies only to officers who retire from service.

The other change is how your 2015 pension grows. While you're serving, each year's pension revalues at CPI plus 1.25%. Once you're deferred, it revalues at CPI only. So it keeps its value against UK prices but stops growing in real terms. It doesn't track the Australian dollar or Australian prices.

Less than two years' service? Different rules apply, including a possible refund of contributions. If that's you, read Police Pay UK's guide to resigning and your pension before you hand in your notice.

Take an officer at the top of the England and Wales constable scale, £50,256 from 1 September 2025. The 2015 scheme builds a pension of 1/55.3 of pensionable earnings each year, so a year at that pay adds about £909 a year of pension.

That pension would be payable at State Pension age, rising with UK CPI in the meantime. What it's worth to you in Australia depends on the exchange rate on each payment date, which nobody can predict. Treat the dollar figure as a sense of scale, not a forecast.

From the 2015 scheme, you can ask for your deferred pension to be paid from age 55, with an actuarial reduction because it'll be paid for longer. The Police Federation says the reduction can be close to 50% at the earliest age, compared with waiting until State Pension age. The reduction factors were updated on 1 August 2026, so older quotes may be out of date.

For an officer who moves to Australia in their 30s or 40s, this is a real decision decades away. A half-sized pension from 55 might suit someone retiring early in Australia, where super can be accessed from preservation age 60 (see super preservation age and access). But it's permanent. Get a quote for both options first.

The McCloud remedy fixes the age discrimination in the 2015 changes. If you have service in the remedy period, 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2022, and were in a legacy scheme before that, you'll be able to choose whether your remedy-period service counts as legacy (1987 or 2006) or 2015 scheme benefits.

For most people that choice comes when benefits are paid: you must choose within 12 weeks of receiving your Remediable Service Statement. For a deferred member in Australia, that may be decades away, but the deadline is still short when it arrives.

1. 1

   Before you leave

   Now

   Ask whether you have remedy-period service and which legacy scheme applies. Note it with your records.

2. 2

   While abroad

   Every year

   Keep your address, email and phone current with your administrator so the statement reaches you.

3. 3

   When you claim

   At payment

   Your Remediable Service Statement compares legacy and 2015 benefits for the remedy period.

4. 4

   Choose within 12 weeks

   Deadline

   The choice can change both the amount and the age that slice is paid from.

Because legacy and 2015 deferred benefits are payable at different ages, the choice can matter more for someone who left early. Police Pay UK's McCloud remedy calculator compares both options.

This is the question we're asked most, and the answer is almost certainly no. Police pensions are unfunded public service defined benefit schemes: there's no pot of money behind your pension. Since 2015, UK law has stopped members of those schemes transferring into anything that offers "flexible benefits", meaning a pot you can draw from as you choose.

That's also why you should be wary of anyone offering to "unlock" or transfer a police pension to Australia. Listing on HMRC's recognised overseas schemes register doesn't override the block. Police Pay UK's guide to transferring in and out of the police pension covers the UK side, including transfers between UK public service schemes.

When your deferred pension becomes payable, you claim it from your force's pension administrator, just as you would in the UK. Your administrator will usually write before your payment age, which is why keeping your contact details current matters so much from overseas. Ask them how they pay members abroad, in which currency, and what proof of life they need.

Currency is the hidden variable. Your pension is set in pounds and rises with UK CPI, but you'll spend it in dollars. At the RBA rate on 9 October 2026, £1 bought A$1.8975. A 10% move in the exchange rate changes your Australian income by 10%, in either direction.

The UK–Australia double tax convention (2003) decides which country taxes your pension. Article 17 says pensions, including government pensions, paid to a resident of Australia are taxable only in Australia. Article 18, which covers government service, specifically excludes pensions. So unlike many UK treaties, your police pension isn't kept in the UK tax net.

To stop UK tax being deducted, you send HMRC form Australia-Individual 2003, which includes a section for the ATO to certify that you're an Australian resident. In Australia, the pension goes in your tax return as foreign income. The ATO lets you deduct the undeducted purchase price, the part of each payment that returns your own contributions, and you can ask it for a determination of that amount.

When you leave the UK, tell HMRC with form P85. Police Pay UK's guide to tax on your police pension covers the UK side, including the lump sum. We couldn't confirm how the ATO treats a police commutation lump sum taken while you're Australian resident, so get advice before you take one.

The UK State Pension is payable to people living in Australia, but it's frozen: no annual increases. You get the rate that applied when you first claimed, or when you moved if you were already being paid. The UK–Australia social security agreement, which could have changed that, ended on 1 March 2001.

What freezing costs is easy to underestimate. As an illustration, if prices rose 3% a year, a frozen pension would buy about 74% of what it did after 10 years (calculated by us). State Pension age is rising to 67, so most officers moving now would claim it decades from now, at whatever rate applies then.

Your Australian force pays employer super on top of your salary: 18% in Queensland, and at least 12% in WA and SA, where SAPOL officers use Triple S or Super SA Select. WA has offered fund choice since 2012, with GESB as the default, and Queensland accumulation members can choose a fund too. Our police superannuation guide compares every force.

Later on, the Australian Age Pension is paid from 67 to people who meet a 10-year residence rule, and it's means-tested. Services Australia counts foreign pensions as income, so your UK police pension may reduce it. See our state guides for WA, SA and Queensland police super.

Give the pension paperwork time: administrators recommend about 3 months' notice of leaving, even though the minimum police notice is one month. Our UK to Australia timeline shows where it fits, and the UK officers' guide covers forces, visas and pay.